Worm! Snippet from TRAPPED for #WeWriWa #SciFiRom

Welcome to another Sunday with Weekend Writing Warriors. Meet writers in various genres and read 8-10 sentence snippets of their stories. Find a new author and sample their work. Enjoy!

I’m continuing my new story, Trapped on Vkani, book 3 in my series Atrapako on Eden. The settings are two remote planets: Eden, a terraformed planet with a colony of humans; and Vkani, an inhospitable planet with scaled human(oid) aliens. You can read about the planets and their inhabitants in my Blog Post HERE.

Maya and her team had planned to explore the ruins of an ancient civilization in the radioactive Deadlands. But a sandstorm buried their shuttle under a thick layer of sand. Their air supply is low, and they have to dig to the surface to call for help.  
In last week’s snippet, Maya met the blue scaled hero of the story. You can read their dramatic first encounter here - https://auroraspringer.blogspot.com/2019/02/large-blue-claws-snippet-from-trapped.html Excuse my misuse of punctuation as their interaction continues.
     It barked a word, an incomprehensible command. Stretching a blue-scaled hand with clawed fingers toward her face, it gripped the neck of her mask.      “No!” she cried, jerking into a sitting position and raising her flattened hand to stop it. Fear sharpened her memories of lessons in the Atrapako language, Kavkani, and she said in halting tones, “Need to breathe.” Not quite correct, but she couldn’t remember their word for nose filter, if such a term existed.     Gripping the hilt of its sword, the Atrapako crouched on one knee at her side and grated, “Worm.” Its voice was as harsh and arid as the landscape of the Deadlands; “Worms crawling out of the dunes; what are you?”      Mentally, she translated the accented Kavkani, and her confidence rose. Looking into the shadowed eyes, she said with improved fluency, “We are not Atrapako; we traveled from another place, a world far from Vkani.”      The Blue growled, “Impossible.”

Marooned on a desolate planet, joining forces with the enemy is their only hope.      Maya Pandita spent years preparing for an expedition to the Deadlands. But her dreams of unearthing ancient artifacts are shattered when her shuttle is buried by a violent sandstorm, and her team is abducted by the scaled inhabitants of the planet. Maya and her companions must try to outwit their blue captor and call for help before they die in the toxic atmosphere.     Sa Vittaran has a problem in his claws. Along with treasures from the ruins, he has retrieved three smooth-skinned foreigners. They will die if he leaves them in the desert. Yet the puny creatures have little value as slaves, except perhaps for the impudent woman who claims to be their leader. He plans to keep her. Her knowledge of the ancient texts will be an asset if she can survive the long trek to his house.       An attack by marauders forces Maya and the Blue leader into a wary alliance. They must work together to thwart the bandits and reunite their company. Can Maya convince Sa Vittaran to help her team? If she fails, they are doomed to a short unpleasant life on the desolate, war-torn planet. 
Book 3 of Atrapako on Eden
Pre-order on Amazon  Apple  B&N  Kobo for release March 22nd
As always, I’ll be happy to reply to your comments.  
Please return to www.wewriwa.com to sample the works of the other writers.

Find a catalog of my published stories HERE . Join me on Facebook  Twitter  Google+